Stop Crime Before It Starts - Securing My Camp-Inn Trailer Part II

As we discussed in Part 1 of Securing My Camp-Inn Trailer, thieves don't care how hard you work to get your things. They only care how easy it is to take it from you. If you have seen my other videos or read my other blog posts, you know I bought a nice Camp-Inn 560 Teardrop Trailer last year. After hearing the horror stories of trailer theft, I started looking at various locking solutions, including coupler locks and wheel locks. No lock is perfect and therefore only a deterrent. So, I wanted my trailer to be less appealing a target to thieves. In Part 1, I talked about coupler options, which lock I chose and why. In this post, I will share more about the wheel lock I chose as a 2nd layer of protection for my trailer.

While the coupler lock is a good deterrent, I saved a long time to get the money to buy our trailer so I wanted to add another layer of security, therefore, I picked up a wheel lock as well. Again, there are a number of options out there with various designs. I wanted something that was easy to put on and take off, rugged and secure when attached, not easily removed by thieves and visible enough to act as a deterrent. I narrowed my choices down here to The Wheel Chock Lock by TriMax and The Claw by the same people that make The Club.

 

 

Both got favorable reviews from users and I think I would have been OK going with either option, but I ended up choosing the TriMax lock. It seemed to just meet my needs a little better and I was a little concerned about the design of the Club and how the locking bar attaches to the claw. I couldn't help but wonder if the attach points could be easily drilled out to remove the bar. I could be wrong and it may not be easily drilled out but I could not find any info either way. The TriMax design has square steel tubing and a plunger lock so there is no locking bar. To me, this just seemed like a better design with less weak points to be of concern and therefore, why I selected the TriMax over The Claw.

TriMax makes two different sizes of this design, the TCL 75 (for larger wheels) and the TCL 65, (my version). It looks to be made from 1/8th inch steel, weighs about 6lbs and is fairly rugged. It is powdered coated bright yellow providing a strong visual to would be thieves that your trailer is secure. It also has rubber tipped arms to prevent scratching or marring of your wheels/rims. The locking mechanism is a brass cylinder with high strength steel shank and a bullet style key/lock (comes with 3 keys) so I don't think it is easy to pick and should resist drilling. The lock is a spring loaded, plunger type and does not require the key to lock it making it easy to put on.

It also has a tire chock feature so that the wheel does not move easily once in place. As mentioned, it has square steel tubing so it is like a hitch/receiver design that fits snugly around the wheel. I have brakes on my trailer and it did not seem to interfere with the brakes in any way. The the version I have (TCL 65) retails for about $50.00 at the time of this posting and sold online and through retailers.

Now, as mentioned, there are also drawbacks to wheel lock solutions. One is that they don't secure the coupler but the other big one is that these are often defeated by just removing the wheel and putting on a temporary spare. There are some wheel lock designs that have a plate type design that covers the lug nuts but the claw style that I am using does not. Therefore, if you go with a claw style wheel lock solution, be sure to also use locking or keyed lug nuts. This will make it more difficult for thieves to remove the wheel and steal your trailer.  You can find locking lug nuts at your local automotive store or an online retailer like Amazon fairly easily. 

Between this lock and the coupler lock covered earlier, I think I have met the original objectives by providing enough of a deterrent so that thieves will decide to move on to an easier target. However, security products are only part of the solution. As I mention in my other blog post, get to know your camp neighbors, good neighbors will help keep an eye on your site while you are not around. If all else fails, I do carry insurance on it but I that is one thing I hope I never have to use.

I will be posting a youtube video of both my coupler lock and wheel lock showing them in more detail and how they install/remove. I will update this blog post with a link to the video once I have it ready. 

As always, feel free to leave a comment or question here or on my YouTube Channel and I will try to answer as best I can.

Until next time, take a bite out of crime and secure your trailer.
Jay T.

Lights, Camera, Action - It's Movie Night

When I was a kid, my dad used to take us to the Drive In Movies. The rows of cars, all parked on those mounds looking up at the large screen. The big, grey metal speaker box hanging from the window. We would get their just before dusk to find a good parking spot. Us kids would run to the playground underneath the giant screen. Just as it got dark, we would race back to find that my parents had set up lawn chairs and pulled out blankets for us. I can remember the smell the buttered popcorn and taste the licorice like it were yesterday. As much as I love camping and getting back to nature, sometimes it can be fun to have a movie night out in the woods. Cooking up some Jiffy Pop over a campfire and firing up a movie can be a great way to meet your camp neighbors and have a relaxing evening among the stars. 

With the advent of modern LED technology, this is easier than ever to do. So, with this post, I thought I would share my thoughts on some recent advances in projectors and players that can help you have your own movie night while camping.

To start, let's talk about projection. Projectors can be big, hot boxes that require the lamp to warm up before you can use it and cool down before you can shut it off. Replacement bulbs were expensive and could be hard to find. But it doesn't have to be that way, not anymore. A couple of years ago, LED technology made rapid advances in projectors enabling small, compact boxes called Pico Projectors that can fit in the palm of your hand. These small projectors can be as small as a book of matches rated around 30-50 Lumens or so to the size of 2 or 3 decks of cards and have a rating up to 300 Lumens or more. I have even seen some that were built into a cell phone case.

As I do a lot of presentations for my day job and not every place has a display available, I picked up an Acer C205 Pico Projector. This is a small and portable projector that is great for work presentations, but it is also great for outdoor movie nights while camping.

Specs:

• 200 Lumens
• Bulb Life 20,000 (standard mode), 30,000 (eco mode)
• Power: A/C, D/C, Internal battery (4200mA)
• Native Res. 854 x 480
• Native format: 16x9
• Min distance: 28.74
• Min screen size: 30"
• Max distance 90"
• Max screen size: 100"
• HDMI Input
• Audio Line In
• USB

I did some quick testing of this projector and posted the video on YouTube here:

Overall, this seems to be a good pico projector. However, there are a lot of options out there so be sure to check out a few different brands.   

However, projectors are only part of the story. How do you get your favorite content to the projector? Just like projectors, there are various options on how to get and view content. Certainly you could bring along a portable DVD player and connect it up to the projector, but if you have a large DVD library, this could mean bringing a LOT of DVDs. If you have movies downloaded from iTunes (or other source) on your mobile device, that could be a good option as well. Another option becoming more and more common is the back up or digital copy of the movie provided by the studios when you purchase a DVD or Blu Ray. To do this, having a good player available that can play that digital copy, something that can play MPEG, h.264 or other digital formats comes in handy.

I discovered some time ago that the Roku 3 is perfect for just such a job. It too is a small box and offers some really nice advantages. First, if you have an internet connection at your campground or have a WiFi hotspot, you can stream movies from the internet just like you would at home (assuming internet bandwidth is sufficient for streaming). Got Netlfix or Amazon Prime? No problem. Second, if you do happen to have digital versions of your movies, it can play those too. Whether they are the digital copies provided by the studio or you have opted to make your own back up copies and put them on a portable back up drive, you can plug that drive directly into the Roku's USB port and voila, you have your favorite content, ready for your enjoyment. Just connect up the Roku box directly to your projector via HDMI add a little power and you are ready for your outdoor moving night.

So, having your own outdoor movie night while camping doesn't have to be all that hard. With just a few ingredients, you can be sitting under the stars enjoying a movie and popcorn by the fire. Just get yourself a pico projector, a media streaming box (like Roku) and bring your favorite content.

UPDATE:
On our recent camping trip to Palmetto State Park, I was able to give this a try in the wild. Overall, the projector did pretty good. The image quality was very good and we were able to easily drive a 10' screen without issue. The picture was bright and clear. However, there was certainly a challenge with the audio as noted in my review video. The speaker was just not powerful enough to deliver a good experience over the evening crickets and general campground noise. You could hear the audio but if there were quiet scenes with dialog, you could not hear what was going on unless you were within about 2 feet of the projector.
 
Solving the audio issues. There are a couple of ways to deal with the poor audio quality depending on how you are setting up your system. If you are connecting through something like the Roku listed above, you will need an HDMI splitter with an audio output on it. You can then hook up powered speakers to the splitter to get your audio. Be sure to do your research as quality on these splitters can be all over the place. Generally they will run about $20.00 and up depending on features, etc. Once I get one, I will do a quick review and let you know how the solution works.

For our weekend trip, I did not have a splitter so I had to work out an alternative. We ended up using a laptop to drive the projector.  We connected up the projector to a laptop via HDMI.  We then hooked up a Bluetooth speaker to the laptop and selected the speaker as the audio source instead of HDMI.  This worked great and we had pretty good sound quality for the movie. 

Hopefully this information helps you as you consider pico projectors for your needs.   

Until next time, save me some popcorn.
Jay T.


    
  

Strangers In A Strange Land - Making Friends While Camping

Camping brings opportunities and provides many benefits. It can bring you close to nature and mend your soul, bring families together that are separated by miles, and even provide opportunities to make new friends. When I was a kid, we knew every family on our street and most on the next street or two over. Everyone looked out for each other, kids played together, we even camped together. This was fairly common way of life so many years ago. However, it seems like times have changed, people get so caught up in their daily lives that people often barely know their neighbors. You may have a friend across the country that you met on Facebook and know everything about them but you barely know the person 50 feet from your front door. You might give a friendly head nod as they pull in their driveway or wave as they are mowing their lawn but you may not really know much else about them.  It shouldn't be this way, humans are social beings, it is part of our DNA. We band together because it makes us stronger and safer but also because it fills our need to have human contact and interaction. 

Camping has a way of bringing people together. While camping, people tend to open up more, embracing human interaction. But how do you meet new people, strike up a conversation? Some people are just not good at making new friends, they find it hard to get engaged. Perhaps they are shy or just awkward in social situations, but we all need and crave human contact. I for one have never been much of a social butterfly...it's never been easy for me to engage strangers in a crowded room. However, I have discovered a way that works for me to meet people while camping. While I did not do this on purpose, one of the best ways I have found to meet new people while camping is to inadvertently leave something at home. Everyone does it, the one item you forgot to pack, it might be a tool or lighter fluid for the coals, but there is always something.

In our case, it was a can opener. While on our maiden voyage with our trailer, we decided to celebrate our first night in our trailer with some steak, broccoli and ranch style beans. However, as we started to prepare dinner we realized we had no way to open the can of beans. So, we reached out to our nearest camp neighbors to borrow a can opener. It was the perfect icebreaker to start a conversation. As it turned out, it was their maiden voyage as well. We spent the entire weekend hanging with our camp neighbors and discovering that we had a lot in common. We enjoyed their company so much, we have stayed in contact with them and even went on other camping trips together.

We have been on both the borrowing end and the lending end. On yet another camping trip, one of our nearest neighbors was having trouble getting their coals lit due to rain the night before. As it so happened, I had an extra bag of coals that were dry. So, when they came over for some help, I was glad to provide some coals and help them get them started. In both cases, it turned out to be a great way to meet camp neighbors and make new friends.

Getting to know your camp neighbors can not only be fun, but also provide useful. Just like at home, camp neighbors that know one another tend to look out for each other. While not common, thieves have targeted campgrounds in the past. They might steal chairs, generators or coolers and friendly camp neighbors can help deter strangers from lurking around your campsite while you might be away. Friendly camp neighbors help form a sort of neighborhood watch.

So, next time you are out camping, leave your can opener at home and take a moment and get to know your camp neighbors. You just might make a lifelong friend and make your camping trip much more enjoyable. Oh, as for the can opener? Well, we never did get the can open as our neighbors didn't have one either but I am still glad we forgot to pack ours.

Some images used in this post provided under Creative Commons License